World Economic Forum on Africa: ILO RD Mr. Aeneas Chuma interview at AIT, Abuja

World Economic Forum on Africa – Assistant Director-General/Regional Director for Africa, Mr. Aeneas Chuma, Live Interview with AIT, Abuja, Thursday 8 May 2014

AIT: It is nice having you rather; it is the World Economic Forum, a lot of business leaders are in town which you also are one; let’s start from the theme of the WEF which is Forging inclusive growth, creating jobs ; is this theme apt, especially for Africa?

ILO Regional Director for Africa: Absolutely, particularly the adjective of inclusive growth and employment; I think it is in recognition that Africa has experienced growth especially in the last decade; and in some countries that growth is double digit. That is also recognition that, that growth is not being widely shared, and so some people are being marginalized; they have been excluded from the benefit of that growth and; the second point is the recognition of the importance of employment; I think employment is critical to poverty reduction and so employment has to be central to growth. So I think the theme is quite appropriate, the time has come …. It is also urging given the challenges Africa faces with respect to unemployment

AIT: Do you think that Nigeria hosting the World Economic Forum being that Nigeria is now Africa Leading economy, has the largest population in Africa, economic growth has been on the average of about 7% in the last 10 years and the macro economy, so to speak, you would say the macro-economy is stable as it were because I know you are an econometrist if I’m not mistaken (Macro-economist) if I’m not mistaken, so you know what I’m talking about. Nigeria hosting despite the insecurity challenge, what is your reaction to that?

ILO Regional Director for Africa: Well, I think Nigeria is extremely important, not just to Africa, but to the world. It is a significant economy, it is the largest economy based on the rebasing that was done recently. It is also a very significant market with tremendous interest. In Nigeria with 170 million people whose incomes are increasing. I mean every regional interest in the world would want to be associated with Nigeria. And as you know Nigeria is now a member of the Security Council and that is significant as well. So it is a very important country economically, politically, regionally for Africa as well in the world. So I think it was time that the World Economic Forum met in Nigeria so that we can gauge and begin to see the potentials that the country has and the opportunity it provides.

AIT: As the head of the delegation of the International Labour Organization which is key because I know Nigeria is also part of the International Labour Organization, you are the head of the delegation to Nigeria as well as the Regional Director for Africa, what do you expect to achieve from this forum.

ILO Regional Director for Africa: Well let me start by saying that we do have an office based in Abuja which covers about eight (8) countries, Anglophone countries, that is very important. What do you expect to achieve? I think it is very important that we continue to raise issues around employment, around growth, issues around social exclusion and marginalization of a large number of our populations in Africa and issues around the importance of social dialogue. I think there is tendency to think that employment and growth and development can be handled just by governments and the private sector. Those are very critical players; let me be very frank about that. But I also need to bring in the other partners, really labour in this respect. So we need to forge, as the ILO, a tripartite partnership between the government, the employers or entrepreneurs, the creators of wealth and a disciplined labour so that development can happen.

AIT: Perhaps, I’m thinking that perhaps you must have engaged heads of corporations across Africa concerning labour in Africa. What has your engagement been so far with perhaps heads of government and heads of corporation in Africa concerning labour?

ILO Regional Director for Africa: A lot of the governments that we have engaged with have signed several conventions, ILO conventions around for example fair labour standards, decent working conditions, and you know one of the leaders in this respect the government of Nigeria. We had conversations in March, with the minister of labour and social welfare, Bar. Emeka Wogu, and the tremendous conventions that Nigeria signed on to and is implementing and all; I think employers and entrepreneurs want discipline in the labour force; they want the labour force that is skilled that they need, going forward, and they also want to do that, then they have to respect the international labour standards and the norms and all, so that they can then accomplish their goals as entrepreneurs and creators of wealth, going forward, and the labour side of it can also meet their obligations to the contractual arrangement that they have. So I think it is in everybody’s interest especially for decent work that labour is treated with respect that there is no discrimination against women or disabled and more importantly, there is absolutely no child labour and child abuse. This is critical.

AIT: But there is a lot of child labour in Africa, not just in Nigeria but some parts of Africa like Cote d’Ivoire, for example where cocoa is gotten in commercial quantity, you know what I’m talking about and where good chocolate are from or made from primary source. What has been the ILO contribution to eradicating that?

ILO Regional Director for Africa: Absolutely one of our largest programmes in West Africa is in fact around Child Labour issues and I accept the proposal that you made with respect to the challenge you made on Cote d’Ivoire which is made rather difficult by the civil strife that the country has gone through in recent years. But it is a priority for us in Africa and we have good partners in this respect, in particular for example, the USID that supports us. So that is an issue that we take particular concern with and we raised with the government and fortunately we do have governments that are committed and try to eradicate this. But this is not to say the problem has been licked as it were. It still exists, but we are working with government, with civil society organizations and also regional organizations like ECOWAS to see how this problem can be stopped.

AIT: Now if we are looking at the World Economic Forum that is on-going now, then those of us local…. have said that perhaps the World Economic Forum is a talk shop as it were, perhaps with no significance at reducing poverty and some of the challenges across the work. Now let me domesticate it to Africa, what do you think

ILO Regional Director for Africa: I think you must understand that it is a forum, it is not a government, it is an economic forum where leaders from the private sector, leaders from government, and also leaders from labour get together and discuss current economic challenges on the continent and that is extremely important; I think the focus on employment, the focus on dealing with the social exclusion is extremely important and this is the type of thing that is brought to the fore at a forum like this. So the forum is essentially meant to create a platform for key players in economic development, be it government, the private sector, or labour to try to look through what they consider an enabling policy and condition so that they can continue to invest. A lot of the debate now really is as the theme points out is how we can promote inclusive growth and as I mentioned earlier there has been growth in Africa over the last 10 years and so we are capable of growing our economies under stable conditions. However, we still find that that growth has been underpinned largely by primary products by extractive industries. Other characteristics of the growth is that it is not generating enough employment opportunities for the large numbers of young people, men and women, that Africa has because Africa is a very young population and very readily available, they are able bodied, they are well educated and they are willing to work. It is the responsibility of policy makers and the entrepreneurs to get together and find ways of making investment that will create jobs for these young people. A forum like this is particularly important because you are talking to practitioners here and policy makers.

AIT: I asked you earlier, let me ask you again, about 202 million people are out of jobs around the world, we also have a significant part in Africa even coming down to my country here, a lot of people are out of work or a lot of people don’t have jobs at all in Nigeria. How do we begin to promote employment because across Africa we have economic growth but it’s jobless growth so to speak.

ILO Regional Director for Africa: I think you are right in terms of the numbers. I think it is estimated that by the end of this decade, it would be 79 million new African entrants into the job market. It’s a huge issue but such a global issue frankly. Even if you recall last year, the European Union held a Youth Employment Summit as well also, but it’s particularly acute in Africa because of the demographics that we face; we’ve got a very young population in Africa; so where you hope you have mature economies and democracies face an ageing population, we are still having a very young population. Now the two ways you can look at this – you can look at this as a resource that needs to be tapped and optimistically; you can look at this as a potential threat to social stability because you can’t have these millions of young Africans who are willing and able to work, they able bodied, they are relatively well educated and have not been given opportunities to get employment so you have to change the strategy that emphasizes growth in jobs, that is one; you have also to encourage entrepreneurship, support entrepreneurship; you have to provide the skills, there has to be a link between the world of work and the world of learning so that by the time the young people leave school, they do have skills that industry and employers can utilize. I think one of the complaints by industry is that a lot of young people are educated but they are unemployable, they don’t have the rights skills so we have to find a mechanism, then of course very well, there is a skill survey, there is an analysis of the skills gap and an encouragement of those that provide training and education, formal and informal, vocational and technical, to ensure that they respond to the needs of the market – the labour market – and I think, perhaps a lot of our countries have not paid enough attention to this – the importance of aligning the supply of labour to the demand for certain skills. So what is required is really a massive investment that requires a tripartite relationship between employers – the entrepreneurs, the government and also the labour force all working together for a common cause in terms of more ...employment generation, poverty reduction.

AIT: You will also agree with me that it’s not just about getting jobs that is key, It’s about getting the job and being rightfully paid for the job that you do because I know that there was a global wages report if I’m not mistaken, by the ILO, I think I saw that last year or so. How have you been promoting that people get adequately paid for the job that they do?

ILO Regional Director for Africa: Well, I think, that’s a very important point because we have observed that in our last report that you mentioned that although there have been advances and improvements in productivity which should result in high wages, a lot of those improvements have largely been captured by managements, especially in advanced economies. The workers’ wages have not kept pace with the increase in productivity, and that is an issue. When you refer to decent work, it just doesn’t refer to decent working conditions, it also refers to decent remuneration for a fair day’s work and that is extremely important; but what you are finding now is that increasingly people work harder and make less and all, so you have now a phenomenon of working poor. People have jobs and work full time, but they remain poor – they can’t meet their basic needs, so these are the challenges that, from what you have seen in the ILO based on the significant knowledge and research that we do in this respect, we will bring this to the attention of policy makers and governments.

AIT: How do you think that Africa is doing because when I looked at that report, I think in the developed economy, it’s just like you’ve said, the doubled rate recession affected their wages, but I think in Africa and perhaps in Asia, we saw like a jump, Africa has 18 % jump, it depends on which part of Africa you are talking about. So what is your reaction?

ILO Regional Director for Africa: I think there are a couple of issues, one is the issue of unemployment in Africa, then there is also the issue of underemployment, a lot of people are underemployed and is not properly measured. Then you have got the issue of informal economy where most of our people are. So I think the challenges are around measurement, as well as the metrics of it; but by and large, the professional positions continue to be reasonably compensated and the distribution is uneven within a country and also between countries, but this is a larger issue.

AIT: Now what would you say are the best practices that ILO is promoting across the world – you said one earlier – child labour. Perhaps you want to expatiate on that because it is really high in Africa. What other best practices are you promoting?

ILO Regional Director for Africa: The ILO primarily is a standard and norms setting organization really from its creation in 1919 and we have championed the rights of workers around, this is done through several conventions that ILO member-states sign on to and then they domesticate into law. And we try to urge that the countries meet these obligations: we try also to urge that countries ensure that the companies operating within their jurisdictions abide by the labour standards. And so issues around employment, issues around jobs for the youth, issues around non-discrimination against women, or against the disabled are just as important as child labour. Child labour is quite urgent as it were, but quite important

AIT: Let’s specify, especially China that I spoke about because there a lot of worries that China, perhaps, isn’t doing business well in Africa growing Foreign Direct Investment of China in Africa; what do you have to say about that because sometimes if you go to some part of Africa, some countries of Africa, the way the Chinese do business, sometimes you may not just be happy about that. I have seen in some African Countries, are you perturbed?

ILO Regional Director for Africa: Well, you know, Chinese huge investment and its engagement in Africa is coursed towards 67 years ago when Chinese state was created. And over time the engagement of Chinese evolved. There was a time China brought a lot of workers, even low level skilled workers - low-skilled level to work here. Increasingly, they are much more strategic – they are involved in infrastructure and others. In some cases there are problems also understanding local labour laws. But as I mentioned earlier, it is the responsibility of government to ensure that local labour laws are followed and that labour standards are upheld not just by foreign companies including China, but also by domestic companies. Our responsibility really is to strengthen the capacity of the government to do that and also the capacity of the workers’ organizations to do that as well and also the capacity of the employers make sure that their members really abide by the laws of the land and observe international standards of labour and employment and decent work.

AIT: Okay, perhaps, I will like to take you back to the wages because it is very, very key and perhaps in income distribution and wage levels in Africa because a lot of people in Africa earn less than $2 a day. How do you think that income can be evenly distributed or can income (it) ever be evenly distributed?

ILO Regional Director for Africa: No I don’t think that it … , well may be it is possible but it will require a lot of effort, a lot of work and a lot of administrative capacity to implement and monitor and all. And so you begin to wonder if it’s worth it. I think what is important; first, I think you are right; we want to recognize that there has been tremendous amount of inequality even in countries that have enjoyed growth significantly in the last decade or so. There’s also a number of people significantly who are the working poor that I referred to. So what is needed here are measures to reduce the income inequality that has increased over the last 10 years but also to ensure decent work results in decent remunerations and payment. It all depends on the circumstances around the country and the conditions … but as a principle to promote decent remuneration for decent work.

AIT: Do you think that perhaps economic growth will also affect income distribution and wage levels?

ILO Regional Director for Africa: Yes, (AIT – it will?) I think it does, to some extent but it shouldn’t. But the outturn of what has happened over the years, as I mentioned earlier that particularly in advanced economies we’ve seen significant improvement in productivity and efficiency and all; but ordinarily that should lead to higher income; but what you have observed also is that a lot of those gains in productivity have already been captured, as it were, by employers through management. There is still some work that needs to be done in this area, it’s not perfect but we still recognize there is need to work, to try and ensure that there is equitable distribution of income. It cannot be equal per se but the challenge is to try and show that the spectre of absolute poverty and deprivation is addressed through some form of social protection, may be, subsidized health, subsidized housing and income grant to address poverty. These are measures that have been tested as well and they do alleviate absolute deprivation. So one need a comprehensive policy really around incomes per se, not just related to employment directly but also will be related to social welfare dimensions, but they all help to reduce absolute suffering and deprivation.

AIT: Okay, lastly, let’s take a look at workers because I know you are also campaigning against that. How do we protect workers across Africa? There’s the issue of domestic workers, how do we protect the rights of workers and domestic workers, so to speak?

ILO Regional Director for Africa: I think there are two dimensions to protection; one has to do with what is called Occupational Health and Safety. There are standards to which a lot of countries have sign on to, requiring certain safety measures in a factory or protective gear: I’m sure you have seen workers at Construction site wearing helmet (I don’t think your earrings are a safety measure – laughter); but domestic workers as well, I think particularly, African domestic workers of countries like Ethiopia, Somalia that have gone in to the Gulf have been abused and we are working with the government there to ensure both governments of the sending countries and also of the governments that are hosting the workers to protect the rights of workers and we do have an office, for example in the Arab States that looks into the issue to ensure that the rights of workers are protected, domestic workers as well.

AIT: Alright, many thanks for joining me on the programme.

ILO Regional Director for Africa: Thank you very much.